President: Consequences of 30-year occupation for Azerbaijani people was deliberate damage to our cultural heritage

The program of the Great Return to the de-occupied territories is among our national priorities. As part of successfully implementing the program, the displaced persons' return has been ensured to the cities of Lachin and Fuzuli and the villages of Aghali, Zabukh and Talish. Nearly 100 hundred thousand displaced persons are envisaged to be returned to their homes in the coming three years. Along with the revival of Karabakh and East Zangazur economic regions and ensuring sustainable resettling of the population, implementing the projects also enables conditions for turning these areas into a developed region, President Ilham Aliyev in his appeal to the participants of the 27th meeting of the Council of Ministers of the ECO.

One of the gravest consequences of a 30-year occupation for the Azerbaijani people was the deliberate damage to our cultural heritage of universal significance, including all the sites associated with the Islamic faith. Regrettably, throughout that time, 65 out of 67 mosques were razed to the ground, and the remaining ones were desecrated by being used for housing animals. The fact of destroying another mosque was revealed most recently where the Malibeyli mosque was used as a barn. All of this is an insult to the feelings of Azerbaijanis and the world’s Muslims, the President said.